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Monday, February 20, 2012

The Future of Us

I loved the premise of The Future of Us by Jay Asher and Carolyn Mackler. In The Future of Us, two teenagers in 1996 stumble upon their facebook pages fifteen years in the future.

Being very close to the age of the book's two main characters, it really made me think about what my 15 year old self in 1996 would have thought about my current facebook page. I think my mind would have been blown by the fact that I live in Wyoming (not sure I really even knew Wyoming was a state in 1996), but I would have been thrilled with the pictures of my dogs.

Sadly, I thought the execution of the book's plot felt short of what I'd hoped it would be. I had a hard time liking Emma. My reflections on my life-past and present were really what made this book for me. My facebook page would have told my 15 year old self that I was supposed to be in Wyoming, married to Evan, and what I was doing, but not what had gotten me here. As Emma and Josh found out, even the tiniest things in 1996 changed their grown up lives.

(One of those tiny changes that I think about that could have changed my life dramatically was when I first came to Wyoming. It was part of a college exchange program. Prior to arriving here, UW sent me a letter telling me my dorm information. After my dad and I had left to come out, another letter came with different dorm information. My mom who was still at home, told us the change so I moved into the new dorm. A couple weeks after I got there, I called my would have been roommate who was wondering what the heck happened to me. As far as she and her RA knew, I had just never shown up--they didn't know my info had been changed. I met some great friends including Evan on my floor in the dorm. I'm sure I wouldn't have met them if I hadn't lived there. What if my mom had come with us and wouldn't have been there to get the mail? What is it'd taken another couple days to show up--after I'd moved into the first dorm? How different would things look today? And really, how many of these thousands of little things got us to exactly where we are?)

Overall, I thought it was a great book for self-reflection, but the story was merely ok.